Vin Maskellhttps://vinmaskell.com
Tender documents. Gentle stories.
Fri, 16 Nov 2018 01:16:39 +0000 en
hourly
1 http://wordpress.com/https://s0.wp.com/i/buttonw-com.pngVin Maskellhttps://vinmaskell.com
Leap of faith (preview)https://vinmaskell.com/2018/11/16/leap-of-faith-preview/
https://vinmaskell.com/2018/11/16/leap-of-faith-preview/#respondFri, 16 Nov 2018 01:16:21 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1346The Big Issue has just published Leap Of Faith, a story about the Christmas, long ago, when I fell down the steps outside church. It was the Christmas, I like to think a little too neatly, that God and I parted ways. It was not a dramatic falling out – only those few steps – but enough to seal my fate. And maybe my faith.

The Big Issue #575. Available from vendors from 16 November to 2 December. Look for Jon Bon Jovi on the cover. (His foundation is fighting homelessness.)

In 2014 I wrote a curious piece about how wearing a particular T-shirt helped me through the suburban trauma of doing the supermarket shopping. It was a lightweight story, for sure, but hopefully there were moments of – if not gravity – then at least some seriousness. Like any story, it was about joining the dots. Fairly disparate dots, on this occasion. I called the story Shelf Life.

The T-shirt depicted a bespectacled footballer by the name of Geoff Blethyn, who played for Essendon, and then Claremont and Port Adelaide, from the late 1960s to the late 1970s. I’ve always barracked for Essendon and I’ve always worn glasses. Geoff played full-forward and kicked goals. In my childhood imagination – especially those backyard dreams – I played full-forward and kicked goals.

Geoff Blethyn may have read the story back in 2014 – the T-shirt’s designer, Chris Rees, forwarded it to him.

About two weeks ago I received an email. From Geoff Blethyn. Suggesting a rendezvous. He’d come across the story again and would like to meet.

So, on a rainy Melbourne Cup Day we met at Windy Hill, spiritual home of Essendon. We chatted inside, just metres from the ground where Geoff played.

]]>https://vinmaskell.com/2018/11/06/meeting-geoff/feed/6vinmaskellThe Final Quarterhttps://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/24/the-final-quarter/
https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/24/the-final-quarter/#commentsMon, 24 Sep 2018 05:25:15 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1321Here, in full, is The Final Quarter, first published in The Big Issue (#570, 7 – 20 September 2018). Your local vendor may still have some back issues. (So to speak.)

Leonard Cohen probably never kicked an Australian Rules football but I know what he meant when he sang “I ache in the places where I used to play” in Tower of Song.

Bob Murphy, retired Western Bulldogs footballer (312 games), kicked many a footy, and I do know what he meant when he wrote that your last game is like the end of childhood.

I have been trying to stave off the end of my childhood all my life but now I ache in the hips and the back when I kick a footy.

Not that I ever played games for a club, unless you count Under 14s. And not that I even kick a full-size footy these days. It’s a size 3 Sherrin, Lyrebird brand. Better to kick a kid’s footy than no footy at all.

Nearing 60 years old, I’m pretty much playing the last quarter of my life. It is, of course, a quarter one hope never ends. No one wants to hear the final siren. No one wants the umpire to blow the whistle, raise the arms and signal game over.

So that’s why you’ll find me on a Sunday morning kicking a small footy with a few mates, some much younger, a few my age or a little older. Just half-a-dozen of us on a good day, barring injuries, family commitments, and the weather. We form a loose circle and move around within half the ground.

Sometimes there are only two of us, so it is strictly kick to kick, back and forth, back and forth.

And sometimes there’s just myself, bouncing the yellow footy into the green grass, walking to the centre circle, the firmest part of the ground. Then walking down to the goals, perhaps imagining a Saturday game here by the local amateurs, perhaps thinking of the week behind and the years ahead. Or the years behind and the weeks ahead. All the while bouncing air out of that ball.

We play all-year round because life is all-year round. The official season may be over but that’s when we’re starting to hit our stride. That’s when – October, November, early December – the weather is kinder to our bodies. Even if some of us can only kick a small footy 30 metres, not much beats the sun on your back under warm skies. (I’ve been known to occasionally play bare-chested on warm mornings.)

As we run (well, jog) toward an errant, mid-directed kick, it could be our childhood, and our mortality, that we’re chasing.

As we mark a perfectly directed and perfectly weighted kick – the right speed, the right height, the right distance – we thank our good fortune to be alive and relatively healthy.

We are not footballers. We do not play in a team or in a competition. We do not belong to a club. But we belong to each other for that hour of a Sunday morning. Small talk is saved for the end of the session. Even then, one of our best players – and we are players of a kind – hardly says a word.

Conversely, our oldest player – nearing 65 – has the gift of the gab. If the kicking and marking is getting sloppy, inevitable as the morning lengthens, he will encourage us by calling and cajoling and joking. And delivering some very accurate old-fashioned kicks. Anyone remember torpedoes, drop-kicks, stab-passes?

Or he may start ‘the count’, to see how many marks we can take collectively and successively. The idea is to keep the ball off the ground for as long as possible, for as many kicks as possible. This makes us play with more care. It turns that part of the morning into, perhaps, a numbered meditation. No one wants to break the chain. Eventually, of course, a kick goes awry or hands fumble or the sun gets in your eyes and the count is over. These days we don’t get anywhere near the century we managed 10 years back, but that’s just another sign of the times.

Soon enough our lungs and our limbs, our hips and our backs, tell us to head to the boundary to ‘warm down’ with shots at goal from all of 20 metres.

If we have not ached now, we may ache during the week. Sometimes players disappear for a month or more. Groin. Hammy. Hip.

But we come back. To re-live childhood. To stave off childhood. To find some wonder and some innocence before the final siren.

It’s the final quarter.

]]>https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/24/the-final-quarter/feed/2vinmaskellThe Australian Reading Hour: All Things Must Passhttps://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/19/the-australian-reading-hour-all-things-must-pass/
https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/19/the-australian-reading-hour-all-things-must-pass/#commentsWed, 19 Sep 2018 23:33:30 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1317Thanks to Hobsons Bay Libraries, I am part of today’s Australian Reading Hour.

I’ve dipped my toe into the world of podcasts and recorded (on my very own phone!) a very short memoir. (Okay, you won’t be surprised that it’s a Stereo Story. Based on a George Harrison song.)

]]>https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/19/the-australian-reading-hour-all-things-must-pass/feed/4vinmaskellMeeting Mirka Morahttps://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/18/meeting-mirka-mora/
https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/18/meeting-mirka-mora/#respondTue, 18 Sep 2018 01:44:24 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1309Reading recent news reports and obituaries of Melbourne artist Mirka Mora , who died in late August, aged 90, I came across some sentences that sounded familiar:

“It’s so funny that we have to die. It’s cruel but it’s terribly funny. You have all these dreams and you’ve got to leave everything. Mind you, in my grave I’ll take some brushes and paint. You never know!”

In 1990 I had the good fortune to interview Mirka Mora, for a series of short interviews I did for The Sunday Age.

I had done some background reading before meeting Mirka in her house in St Kilda. But such research could only glimpse the tip of the iceberg of her life. As soon as I stepped into her home I wondered how I could capture its charm, and her charm.

The quoted sentences above were from the end of my interview. Nice to know that some stories last.

Rest In Peace, Mirka Mora.

The Sunday Age, June 17, 1990

]]>https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/18/meeting-mirka-mora/feed/0vinmaskellThe Final Quarter (preview)https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/09/the-final-quarter-preview/
https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/09/the-final-quarter-preview/#respondSun, 09 Sep 2018 23:13:55 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1303It’s been a while since I’ve written for The Big Issue Australia.

The Final Quarter is another footy story but it quotes Leonard Cohen at the start:

“I ache in the places where I used to play”.

Find your local vendor and ask for the latest edition, # 570.

Cheers

]]>https://vinmaskell.com/2018/09/09/the-final-quarter-preview/feed/0vinmaskellHandyman blueshttps://vinmaskell.com/2018/01/07/handyman-blues/
https://vinmaskell.com/2018/01/07/handyman-blues/#respondSun, 07 Jan 2018 21:14:19 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1300Here’s a Stereo Story about being up on a roof in a storm and not knowing what to do. Many thanks to friend and fellow writer/letter-writer Paul Bateman.
]]>https://vinmaskell.com/2018/01/07/handyman-blues/feed/0vinmaskellWater talkhttps://vinmaskell.com/2017/11/13/water-talk/
https://vinmaskell.com/2017/11/13/water-talk/#commentsMon, 13 Nov 2017 08:14:36 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1296We stood talking in the water.
Waist deep. 6.30am. Saturday.
I’d just managed 100 metres in the shallows without drowning.
He was about to do an easy 1500. Probably more.
I was heading into shore.
He was heading into the deep.
We stood talking in the water.Common humanity.
He farewelled me with ‘See you brother’, and started swimming.
I felt humbled, honoured.
I dried and dressed.
Took my time.
Saturday, after all.
Sun up.
Fishing boats out.
Kayakers. Kiosk.
Walkers. Joggers.
I strolled my bike past the clubrooms, looking into the sun.
He was silhouetted, walking into shore. Waist deep.
I raised an arm in farewell.
He waved back.
Common humanity.
]]>https://vinmaskell.com/2017/11/13/water-talk/feed/4vinmaskellDown the Garden Path (preview)https://vinmaskell.com/2017/09/23/down-the-garden-path-preview/
https://vinmaskell.com/2017/09/23/down-the-garden-path-preview/#respondSat, 23 Sep 2017 23:59:59 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1289The Big Issue has just published Down the Garden Path. Here’s how it starts:

My neighbor pulls up as I’m standing in my front yard looking, again, at all the weeds, wondering where on earth to start.

]]>https://vinmaskell.com/2017/09/23/down-the-garden-path-preview/feed/0vinmaskellTour de Failurehttps://vinmaskell.com/2017/07/28/tour-de-failure/
https://vinmaskell.com/2017/07/28/tour-de-failure/#commentsFri, 28 Jul 2017 05:40:34 +0000http://vinmaskell.com/?p=1283Here’s the cycling story The Big Issue ran a few weeks back under the headline Tour de Flat. (#540 30 June to 13 Jul7 2017). Cheers.

Flat tyres fill cyclist Vin Maskell with dread but he always gets back on his bike. Eventually.

I was stranded by the roadside, about eight kilometres from home. Flat back tyre. A fellow cyclist pulled over. “Need a hand?”

“Yes.” And then apologetically, “I’ve got nothing.”

By which I meant, not only no spare tube, no levers and no pump, (and no phone) but no skills in basic bicycle maintenance, no confidence at all in repairing a flat tyre by the side of the road. (At home, in the garage, maybe – but even then it’s a slow, steep uphill battle between success and failure.)

The Good Samaritan cyclist did not hesitate. Pulled out his own spare tube, his levers, his pump. Ten minutes later I was back on the road and the kind stranger had disappeared into the distance. I’d thanked him, of course, but it hadn’t even occurred to me to offer to pay for his spare tube (not that I had my wallet on me). I had nothing.

Flat tyres deflate me. They defeat me. They are my nemesis and, given the amount of punctures I’ve had lately, Flat Tyres could be my namesake.

Cycling is in my blood. My father cycled until the day he died. (Not very far, but he was in his eighth decade.) Cycling is my preferred form of transport for short distances. It’s my preferred form of exercise (you’ll never find me in a gym). It’s one of my hobbies. And it’s the child inside the adult, still alive, still innocent.

And yet. I get a flat tyre and I almost fall to pieces. I am no mechanic, not even for as simple a machine as a bicycle. I’ve tried to fix punctures, I really have. I’ve tried to replace tubes. I’ve tried to be independent and grown-up and practical but more often than not I’ve failed, I’ve come up short. Very short.

Who knows how many hours I’ve wasted fiddling with patches and pumps and tyres and tubes and patience and common sense and found myself still standing there with a bicycle that’s not going anywhere?

Inept. Useless. Hopeless. Pathetic. I try not to be too hard on myself.

Eventually I have to ask for help. Sometimes my neighbour Richard (a serious, Lycra cyclist) gives me a hand. He can see I’m battling and is very tactful. He shows me what to do, he coaches me, he makes me feel I’ve actually done something when – really – I’ve looked on as he’s accomplished in ten minutes what I’ve failed to do in thirty.

But I don’t want to impose on Richard too much, so I often take my flat tyre and my flat self to the local bike-shop where John, also a tactful man, takes care of things. Twenty dollars later I’m on the road again.

I know I should do a short course in basic bicycle maintenance, or at least look up YouTube.

Some days I’m afraid to ride for fear of another flat. But not riding is like not breathing. It’s not really an option. (Yes, there’s the car in the driveway, and the train and the bus, but they are not a patch on – so to speak – the instinct to cycle.)

Of course, I’ve had periods, a year or two, with no problems. No punctures. No worries. Life can be like that sometimes. I also know there are more important issues to worry about than flat tyres.

I have to tell myself that the moment my tube loses all its air is only an accumulation of a series of microscopic, unfortunate events: a tiny shard of glass or a nail or a pin or a stone finds its way from the road and onto my tyre and through that tyre and into the tube. What are the chances?

I know this is not existential dread. This is not despair. This is not life without meaning.

It’s just a sudden but temporary loss of air.

Each year I watch the Tour de France. I don’t understand the tactics and strategies of cycling races but I do appreciate the gorgeous views of the European countryside, the fitness of the cyclists and, especially the resources and finesse of those support crews in their cars, loaded with spare wheels and spare bikes.

When Tour de France cyclists get a flat tyre it’s no big deal (unless they’re careening down a mountain at 100 kilometres an hour!). No, in a matter of seconds they’re back on the road, back in the race, back in the game of life.

My support crew is neighbour Richard, bike-shop John and a Good Samaritan. Without them I’ve got nothing.

Postscript: On the day I bought The Big Issue edition with this story I got a flat front tyre. Drawing pin.